Trump is wrong about solar power, Maga diehards say - The Times

Maga influencers are hoping to change President Trump’s mind on solar power, praising the renewable source widely supported by his base.

Trump has previously called solar power “farmer-destroying” and describes renewable energy as the “scam of the century”. But in recent weeks two high-profile Maga influencers have publicly touted solar, citing polling showing a majority of Trump voters backed the energy source.

Katie Miller, a podcaster and wife of the senior White House aide Stephen Miller, posted on X: “Solar energy is the energy of the future. [There is a] giant fusion reactor up there in the sky — we must rapidly expand solar to compete with China.”

• Sign up for The Times’s weekly US newsletter

A new strategy memo from the largest American clean-energy lobby is now seeking to use conservative influencers such as Miller to “amplify the benefits of solar energy”, according to the news site Politico.

The memo distributed earlier this month detailed an “American Energy First” campaign launched by the American Clean Power Association. The push involved amplifying polling by Kellyanne Conway, another Maga influencer who ran Trump’s 2016 campaign.

Miller said she was not being paid by either the association nor the campaign in a statement to Politico. “I do not have a paid partnership with them,” she said.

Last week a poll from Conway’s firm, which surveyed voters in five states that backed Trump in 2024, found that three quarters of Trump voters agreed that solar should be used “to strengthen and increase” the domestic energy supply.

• Orsted to resume US wind farm construction despite Trump ban

Another recent poll conducted by Fabrizio, Lee & Associates — where Tony Fabrizio, chief pollster for Trump’s campaigns, is a partner — found a majority of Trump-coalition voters backed solar. That support increased if the panels were made in the US without using materials from China.

The Maga push also comes amid a surge in electricity demand, which is expected to increase by 32 per cent by 2030, with data centres accounting for more than half of that growth, according to an analysis by the power-sector consulting firm Grid Strategies. Figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed electricity costs were up 6.3 per cent from a year earlier.

The Trump administration has taken steps to hamper the US solar industry. The One Big Beautiful Bill Act ended Biden-era subsidies for new projects years earlier than planned and officials have added onerous new layers of review.

The president reserves particular ire for wind power, or “windmills”, having warned in January that the UK was making a “big mistake” by embracing the energy source. But he has also described solar energy as “a blight on our country”.

In contrast Trump has sought to expand fossil-fuel production, moving to accelerate leasing for what he calls “beautiful, clean coal” in addition to oil and gas.

There are now, however, early signs that the administration could be preparing to ease solar restrictions. This week Politico reported that the Department of the Interior was now reviewing 20 large solar projects, suggesting a possible softening in the administration’s policy requiring Doug Burgum, the interior secretary, to review all permits.

A new solar project in Nevada, which derives one third of its electricity from solar, was also advanced in December after Joe Lombardo, Nevada’s Republican governor up for re-election this year, asked Burgum to reform the review process.